Inspired in part by oral histories of the people and cultures of Oceania, the Walt Disney Animation Studios feature Moana is a sweeping adventure about an adventurous teenager (voiced by newcomer Auli‘i Cravalho) who sails out on a daring mission to save her people. Equal parts brave and compassionate, the16-year-old daughter of the chief cannot deny how drawn she is to the ocean, so when she must journey out on her own to find Maui (voiced by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson), demigod of the wind and sea, and save her people, she lets her strength and determination guide her.
During both a press conference and a 1-on-1 interview co-directors Ron Clements and John Musker (The Little Mermaid, Aladdin) talked about tackling their first CG feature, the research that went into bringing this culture to audiences, making the ocean a three-dimensional character, their hopes for Moana’s place among the other classic Disney characters, and the potential of further stories in this world.
Question: As veterans of hand-drawn animation, what was it like to tackle your first CG feature? Was that something you were nervous about, at all?
JOHN MUSKER: We really didn’t know much about it. We loved the CG films we had seen, like Tangled and Frozen. The things they could do, we knew were amazing, particularly for this movie. We knew we wanted to do a living ocean, and to do that hand-drawn, it just wouldn’t have the effect that it has here. That also goes for all the fabrics and all of the texture of that world, and even the volumetric quality of that universe. The people’s faces have planes and with the landscape of those islands, it felt volumetric and not flat. They gave us tutorials, as they were getting into this, and they explained the pipeline and the jobs that exist, and how it goes from one thing to another. It wasn’t the path we were used to.
RON CLEMENTS: And that was important because that part of it is really different. Things like scripting, story and voice recording are all the same. But, the production process is significantly different. It’s more complicated. It’s simpler in hand drawing. You’ve got layout, rough animation, clean-up animation, animation with effects, and final with color. It’s very easy to tell the difference in each stage. There are definite steps forward. It’s all over the place in digital. You’re seeing things, back and forth, in so many different stages. You’re seeing scenes where you’re only supposed to be focused on one specific aspect of what you’re looking at and you have to trust that other things will be what they’re supposed to be. It’s complicated.
MUSKER: In some ways, the scariest thing was working with CG character animation. It’s not just changing the technique, but we had worked with the same animators, over a number of years. This is a whole different group of people, so we relied heavily on our heads of animation, who knew the talents of these people, and then we got to know them. Now, I know these 90 animators that do it and I’m unbelievably impressed with how they do it. A lot of them are younger, in their 20s and 30s, and they’ll say things like, “I got into animation because I saw The Little Mermaid when I was eight.” It’s great to hear that. And then, they say, “And I get to work on a movie with you old guys!”
CLEMENTS: I was 20 years old when I started at Disney, and they were just starting the talent development program. Most of the people there were these guys in the 60s, and there was not much in between. There were guys in their 20s and guys in their 60s.
MUSKER: The doors were closed at Disney, for a long time.
CLEMENTS: I worked with an animator named Frank Thomas, who was my mentor. He’s a legendary animator, who is one of the nine old men. I was 20, and he was 62 and teaching me animation. I’m 63 now.
MUSKER: This go full circle, and now we’re working with 25-year-old animators. He’s Frank Thomas now.
This movie felt like a classic Disney animated movie. What kind of research went into this, and how did you go about getting that island vibe and the legend so authentic?
CLEMENTS: This movie actually started a little over five years ago, which is not that unusual for an animated film. It was John Lasseter’s idea. He wanted to do a movie based on the world of the Pacific Islands and the mythology, which led to, about five years ago, taking a trip to Fiji, Samoa and Tahiti. That was really the basis of the movie, in terms of the connection to navigation, people’s connection to their ancestry and the respect for nature. A lot of those ideas came from that first research trip, and the movie was heavily inspired by that. The people that we met have stayed involved with the movie, throughout its production process, to help us capture as much as we could, of all the wondrous things we learned and the wonderful people that we met.
Since your visit “Under the Sea” with The Little Mermaid, what has happened with technology that allowed you to now make the ocean an actual three-dimensional character within the film?
MUSKER: Someone asked us, “Could you have done that, when you did The Little Mermaid?,” and the answer is no. But actually, even five years ago, I think it would have been much harder to do it. The technology just keeps developing, all the time. When we were in the Islands, early on, people talked about the ocean as if it were alive. They caressed it and had these personal relationships with it, so we knew we wanted the ocean to be a character in the movie. We also knew that we wanted to have a lava monster in the movie. We didn’t know how to do it, so we talked to a lot of very smart people, but they didn’t know how to do it either. They said, “This is going to be really, really hard, but we think we can figure it out before the movie needs to come out,” and they did. There’s groundbreaking technology in this movie. There are a lot of things in this movie, including what was done with Maui’s hair and Moana’s hair, that are really breakthroughs in technology.
After spending so much time working on this, what was it like to see it all come together?
CLEMENTS: It’s interesting, this was our first CG film and one of the differences in the process is that, compared to a hand drawn film, things develop much slower. Everything, along with the story, which goes through a lot of changes, has to be built. The characters have to be designed, modeled, and rigged. Every element of the environments has to be built. There is so much testing and research going on that you don’t see a lot, at first, in terms of what it’s going to be. You have to be patient because you have to wait a long time. And then, at the end, there’s a more compressed schedule. Some of this movie was made before last January, but the bulk of this film was actually made since last January, and at a fairly rapid rate. So, when we saw it actually start to come together, it wasn’t that long ago, and we were blown away by a lot of the stuff that we were seeing with the animation, effects, lighting, textures, tech animation, and hair. It all just looks so cool. It took a long time, but it’s very fun to see it all come together.
MUSKER: When we hear the score on any of the movies, that’s when it becomes the most real. That’s when the emotion really kicks in and it really is powerful.
No matter what else happens, you guys will always be remembered for your work in animation for Disney, especially with The Little Mermaid and Aladdin, which are just so iconic. What do you think Moana’s place will be, among all of the beloved Disney characters?
MUSKER: I hope she takes her place alongside the other characters.
CLEMENTS: The evolution goes all the way back to the beginning, with Snow White.
MUSKER: Even when we did The Little Mermaid, we wanted it to be able to sit on a shelf with Cinderella, Snow White and those classic films. We hope Moana sits on that same shelf, and that it’s an iconic movie.
CLEMENTS: I think there’s an aspect of Moana that separates her from the other Disney heroines, certainly the ones that we’ve done, but also all of them, in that there is no romance in the story. That was always the intention, once the story of this 16-year-old girl emerged from our research. She is the hero of the story, in an action hero mode. She goes on a journey and quest, and her mission is to save her people, while she faces obstacle after obstacle. She has qualities of relentlessness and great empathy, and she becomes the person that she’s meant to be. All of those things make her a little different, I think.
With a film like this, there is always the possibility of more stories in this world, whether it’s a sequel, a Christmas special, like Frozen is doing for next year, or a TV show, like with Tangled and Big Hero 6, or a short. Which character that we only got a glimpse of would you, personally, like to see more story for?
MUSKER: I think we could have Heihei solve crimes. He and Pua can open a detective agency. I’m kidding.
CLEMENTS: There could be more done with the Kakamora. We don’t even know what they look like, inside those coconut shells.
MUSKER: They previewed the movie, around the world, and I read some of the results that came back. They previewed the movie in Australia and they asked them, “Would you be interested in seeing a sequel to this movie?,” and 92% of them said yes. But, I don’t think that way. I was like, “Really?!” For me, I’m just so focused on the movie itself. But if it has a life of its own, that would be great.
CLEMENTS: I think there is an implication that Moana is going to go on to have other adventures. Whether or not she ever does in the movies, you feel like she’s just getting started. It’s not quite a happily ever after story.
MUSKER: It’s sort of an origin story.
CLEMENTS: There was a thousand year gap where, in the actual history, they stopped voyaging for a thousand years, and then they started up again, two thousand years ago, and that’s what Moana is doing, at the end of the movie. At that point, half of the Pacific Islands have been explored, but Hawaii and New Zealand are out there. They haven’t been populated yet. So, who knows. There’s a future there.
MUSKER: You could spin it off, in different directions. There’s an ensemble cast, and they could emerge into something. We’ll see how it’s received and where it goes.
Moana opens in theaters on November 23rd.